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Allow me to introduce you to Acca sellowiana, previously Fejoia sellowiana and known to its close friends as the pineapple guava.

Allow me to introduce you to Acca sellowiana, previously Fejoia sellowiana and known to its close friends as the pineapple guava.

This is one of the most remarkable plants in my garden. I bought it many years ago from a rather wonderful nursery near Kidderminster called Stone House Cottage Nurseries (where they also have a series of brick towers from which, occasionally, trumpeters trumpet). I chose it on a whim, without having ever seen a mature specimen.

Thank goodness for the impulse buy! Acca sellowiana was one of the first plants I planted in this garden and has given enormous pleasure every summer. It is a South American evergreen shrub with silvery leaves, which will thrive on a sunny wall with shelter from the cold winds. My specimen suffered a bit in the very cold winter a couple of years ago, but is now fully recovered. It will usually grow to about two metres in height, although I once saw one in Devon topping four metres.

But the flower is the thing that makes Acca sellowiana special: eccentric, colourful, exotic, amusing and generally gorgeous. And, as if that isn’t enough, the petals taste slightly of candyfloss, adding a little extra ‘zip’ to summer cocktails. If we get a hot summer (cue hollow laughs all round) then it will develop small, edible fruits, which taste of pineapple.

Of course not every impulse buy is as successful - don’t ask me about the pretty little pink convolvulus which we bought a few years ago and has now popped up in all sorts of inconvenient places. Sometimes, though, it is worth taking a gamble purely because you like the description of a plant or even just because you like the name.